To gaze upon these secrets of the deep?
Clar. Methought, I had; and often did I strive To yield the ghost: but still the envious flood Kept in my soul, and would not let it forth To seek the empty, vast, and wandering air; But smother'd it within my panting bulk, Which almost burst to belch it in the sea. Brak. Awaked you not with this sore agony? Clar. O, no, my dream was lengthen'd after life; O, then began the tempest to my soul !
I pass'd, methought, the melancholy flood,
With that grim ferryman which poets write of,
Unto the kingdom of perpetual night.
The first that there did greet my stranger soul
Was my great father-in-law, renown'd Warwick;
Who cried aloud, "What scourge for perjury
Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence ?"
And so he vanish'd: Then came wandering by
A shadow like an angel, with bright hair
Dabbled in blood; and he shriek'd out aloud,
"Clarence is come, false, fleeting, perjured Clarence,
That stabb'd me in the field by Tewkesbury;
Seize on him, furies, take him to your torments!"
With that, methought, a legion of foul fiends
Environ'd me, and howled in mine ears
Such hideous cries, that with the very noise
I trembling waked, and for a season after,
Could not believe but that I was in hell;
Such terrible impression made my dream.
Brak. No marvel, lord, that it affrighted you;
I am afraid, methinks, to hear you tell it.
Clar. O, Brakenbury, I have done these things,
That now give evidence against my soul,
For Edward's sake; and, see, how he requites me!
O God! if my deep prayers cannot appease thee,
But thou wilt be avenged on my misdeeds,
Yet execute thy wrath on me alone:
O, spare my guiltless wife, and my poor children!
pray thee, gentle keeper, stay by me;
My soul is heavy, and I fain would sleep.
CATO'S SOLILOQUY.
It must be so-Plato, thou reason'st well !—
Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire,
This longing after immortality?
Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror
Of falling into nought? Why shrinks the soul
Back on herself, and startles at destruction ?
'Tis the Divinity that stirs within us;
'Tis Heaven itself that points out an hereafter, And intimates eternity to man.
Eternity! thou pleasing, dreadful thought!
Through what variety of untried being,
Through what new scenes and changes must we pass !
The wide, the unbounded prospect lies before me;
But shadows, clouds, and darkness, rest upon it.
Here will I hold. If there's a power above us,
(And that there is, all Nature cries aloud
Through all her works,) he must delight in virtue
And that which he delights in, must be happy.
But when! or where!-This world was made for Cæsar.
I am weary of conjectures-this must end them.
Thus am I doubly arm'd: my death and life,
My bane and antidote are both before me:
This in a moment brings me to an end,
But this informs me I shall never die.
The soul, secured in her existence, smiles
At the drawn dagger, and defies its point.
The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years,
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth,
Unhurt amidst the war of elements,
The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds.
Adam. What! my young master? Omy gentle master, O my sweet master, O you memory
Of old Sir Rowland! why, what make you here?
Why are you virtuous? Why do people love you? 5
And wherefore are you gentle, strong and valiant?
Why would you be so fond to overcome
The bony priser of the humorous duke?
Your praise is come too swiftly home before you.
Know you not, master, to some kind of men
Their graces serve them but as enemies?
No more do yours; your virtues, gentle master,
Are sanctified and holy traitors to you.
O, what a world is this, when what is comely
Envenoms him that bears it!
Orlan. Why, what's the matter ?
Come not within these doors; within this roof
The enemy of all your graces lives:
Your brother (no, no brother; yet the son-
Yet not the son ;-I will not call him son-
Of him I was about to call his father)—
Hath heard your praises; and this night he means
To burn the lodging where you use to lie,
And you within it: if he fail of that,
He will have other means to cut you off;
I overheard him, and his practices.
This is no place, this house is but a butchery:
Abhor it, fear it, do not enter it.
Orlan. Why, whither, Adam, wouldst thou have
Adam. No matter whither, so you come not here.
Orlan. What, wouldst thou have me go and beg my
Or, with a base and boisterous sword, enforce
A thievish living on the common road?
This I must do, or know not what to do;
Yet this I will not do, do how I can:
I rather will subject me to the malice
Of a diverted blood, and bloody brother.
Adam. But do not so: I have five hundred crowns,
The thrifty hire I saved under your father,
Which I did store, to be my foster nurse,
When service should in my old limbs lie lame,
And unregarded age in corners thrown:
Take that; and He that doth the ravens feed,
Yea, providently caters for the sparrow,
Be comfort to my age! Here is the gold:
All this I give you. Let me be your servant:
Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty;
For in my youth I never did apply
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood;
Nor did not with unbashful forehead woo
The means of weakness and debility;
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter,
Frosty, but kindly: let me go with you;
I'll do the service of a younger man
In all your business and necessities.
Orlan. O good old man; how well in thee appears The constant service of the antique world,
When service sweat for duty, not for meed!
Thou art not for the fashion of these times,
Where none will sweat, but for promotion;
And having that, do choke their service up
Ev'n with the having: it is not so with thee.
But, poor old man, thou prunest a rotten tree,
That cannot so much as a blossom yield,
In lieu of all thy pains and husbandry:
But come thy ways, we'll go along together;
And ere we have thy youthful wages spent,
We'll light upon some settled low content.
Adam. Master, go on; and I will follow thee,
To the last gasp, with truth and loyalty :—
From seventeen years till now almost fourscore
Ilere lived I, but now live here no more.
At seventeen years many their fortunes seek;
But at fourscore it is too late a week:
Yet fortune cannot recompense me better,
Than to die well and not my master's debtor.
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